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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28325865">i have begun to ask for you (i who have no need)</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Damkianna/pseuds/Damkianna'>Damkianna</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Pawns &amp; Symbols - Majliss Larson, Star Trek - Various Authors</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Amnesia, Arguing, F/M, Gen, Post-Canon, Rescue, Unresolved Emotional Tension, Unresolved Sexual Tension, Yuletide Treat</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-12-25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-12-25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 17:34:30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,922</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28325865</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Damkianna/pseuds/Damkianna</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>"Then go find some wares more to your taste," the crewman spat, "and get out of our way."</p><p>"No," the Klingon said, and then—then, at last, his eyes did flicker to her after all. To her, and no one else; he didn't have to search the faces of the other slaves to find hers, wasn't looking them over and singling her out as the best-suited to his needs. It was as if he'd known she'd be there, as if he'd seen her the moment the turbolift doors had opened and tracked her every motion since, but only now was willing to give away that he had.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Jean Czerny/Tirax</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>8</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Yuletide Madness 2020</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>i have begun to ask for you (i who have no need)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sandrine/gifts">Sandrine Shaw (Sandrine)</a>.</li>



    </ul><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>I couldn't quiiiiite finish this in time to get it into the main collection, Sandrine—I hope you like it, and happy Yuletide Madness! :D ♥</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p> </p><p>"Hurry up," said the man in front of her, tugging on the restraints around her wrists.</p><p>There were restraints around her ankles, too; she stumbled over the edge of the airlock hatch, trying to keep up. He turned, cursing, and sneered at her.</p><p>He was green. So were most of his crewmates. One of them was blue, and had a head that was shaped differently, structures that rose from the forehead.</p><p>She wasn't green. She wasn't blue, either, and there was nothing on her forehead except her eyebrows. Her skin was a color a little more difficult to quantify, pale brown-peach-pink. Her hair was dark, and she wasn't very tall.</p><p>That was all she knew about herself. They had never given her a mirror. She'd felt her face with her hands, bewildered and curious, but she didn't know how to turn the topography she'd covered with her fingers into an understanding of visual appearance.</p><p>She remembered nothing but the ship, and its green crew except for the one who was blue, and the restraints.</p><p>They'd docked at a space station, now. She was almost glad she'd stumbled, coming out of the airlock; it gave her a moment to absorb the change. The ship—the only place that was familiar to her, as far as she knew—was much smaller than this station, and there were so many more people on it than she was used to.</p><p>"Come on, come on," the man urged her, and pulled.</p><p>The station, or at least this—deck?—of it, was open, round, filled with people of all shapes and colors. Doors were positioned at intervals along the outer wall, in between other airlocks that must have led to other docking bays.</p><p>Probably turbolifts, she thought, and then didn't know why she'd thought it. The ship, the only ship she knew, was small; if there were other decks on it besides the one where she and the other slaves had been kept, she'd never been to any of them.</p><p>She and the other slaves were being guided to the nearest set of doors. It was a turbolift after all, she was almost sure of it. A large one, enough to fit forty or fifty without trouble. They were pushed in, surrounded by the green crewmen—not to hide them, she thought, but to keep any of them from trying to slip back through the doors and away into the crowd. No pains had been taken to conceal their restraints. Whoever ran this space station, they presumably had no rules forbidding the transport or trade of slaves.</p><p>There should be. Shouldn't there? She closed her eyes, and tried not to think about it too hard. Thinking about it too hard—the things she knew without understanding why she knew them, the expectations she sometimes discovered she had about how people should be treated—brought on the headaches, which could grow so bad she could hardly stand. She didn't want that to happen right now. She didn't want to draw attention.</p><p>The turbolift moved. Some of her fellows seemed distressed, disoriented, by the way it felt. She looked inside herself, and found nothing. She was fine. She was—used to it.</p><p>The doors reopened. They were facing a cargo bay, lights on but dimmed; empty, unused.</p><p>They began to file out. She had just stepped through the doors when she realized the cargo bay wasn't empty after all.</p><p>There was a man standing in it. At ease, almost conspicuously so: feet planted, arms crossed over his chest, chin lifted arrogantly. <em>He</em> was tall, tall and dark-haired, sharp-eyed, with skin that looked almost like hers.</p><p>She went still, swallowing, heart pounding. Was he here for her?</p><p>She searched his face. She couldn't tell whether he was familiar, or whether she was just desperate to believe that he was.</p><p>He wasn't looking at her. He was looking at the green crewmen, the hard line of his mouth slowly twisting into a sneer.</p><p>"Go on," the crewman nearest her said, shoving her in the shoulder. Then he spotted the man waiting in the cargo bay, too, and jerked in surprise. "This bay is in use—"</p><p>"Yes," the arrogant man said, in a low rough voice that made her skin feel too tight. "Bought and paid for by the profits of honest labor, I'm sure. That's what your kind are known for, Orion."</p><p>The crewman bared his teeth. "And you're here for a slave? Not what your kind are known for, Klingon."</p><p>Klingon. She wasn't a Klingon, was she? She felt sure she knew the word; a bright pulse of pain lanced between her temples, but she clung to the knowledge anyway. She knew the word. But she didn't think it was the word for her.</p><p>"We win the right to be served, in battle," the Klingon agreed, lip curling. "It cannot be bought or bartered."</p><p>"Then go find some wares more to your taste," the crewman spat, "and get out of our way."</p><p>"No," the Klingon said, and then—then, at last, his eyes did flicker to her after all. To her, and no one else; he didn't have to search the faces of the other slaves to find hers, wasn't looking them over and singling her out as the best-suited to his needs. It was as if he'd known she'd be there, as if he'd seen her the moment the turbolift doors had opened and tracked her every motion since, but only now was willing to give away that he had.</p><p>She stared back at him helplessly, breath caught in her throat. Did he know her? Had he known her before—where she came from, who she was? Her name?</p><p>"You've taken something that doesn't belong to you," he said, and he was speaking to the crewman, but his gaze hadn't left her. "And I won't leave without it."</p><p>The crewman laughed. "You're too late," he said, almost pitying; she knew immediately that the Klingon would hate that tone, would have hated it from anyone and hated it even more coming from this slaver. Sure enough, the Klingon's eyes jerked from her to the crewman, suddenly black with fury, and his hard flat mouth grew harder and flatter, a muscle leaping with tension in his jaw.</p><p>If the crewman could tell, he showed no sign of it.</p><p>"These," he added, gesturing to all the slaves standing huddled in their restraints, "have already been prepared for sale."</p><p>"Prepared for sale," the Klingon repeated, as if he knew what that meant—he looked at her again, almost sharply this time, searching her face as intently as she'd searched his a minute ago.</p><p>She didn't know what he was looking for, didn't know how to give it to him. She stared back, uncertain, unmoored, and the Klingon breathed out something that must have been a curse and turned back to the crewman.</p><p>"That one," he said, jabbing a hand toward her. "Give her to me, and I'll leave."</p><p>"You have proof of prior ownership?"</p><p>"Proof of—" The Klingon stopped, incredulous, scowling, and stalked closer to the crewman. "She's <em>Federation</em>, you filthy space-scum. So was the transport your pirate friends attacked. You think they haven't noticed? You think they aren't looking for her? You think they're going to shrug their shoulders and let you get away with selling one of their officers for a profit?"</p><p>"This isn't Federation space," the crewman spat, but he looked tenser now, less sure of himself. "Besides, if that's true, then what are <em>you</em> doing asking for her?"</p><p>The Klingon smiled, slow, teeth showing. "She's bond to me," he said.</p><p>She didn't know what that meant, any more than she'd known what "Federation" meant; she didn't remember a transport, or pirates, and she didn't remember this Klingon.</p><p>But the crewman sucked in a sharp breath, throat working. "So?" he said. It was stalling, she understood, an attempt to avoid giving way. His hand had dropped to the weapon at his hip.</p><p>"So," the Klingon said, "if you don't respect bond-right, then I'll gladly teach you to."</p><p>The crewman looked the Klingon up and down pointedly, where he stood alone, and then glanced over his shoulder at his own fellows, who numbered a good dozen. "You will, will you?"</p><p>"Yes," the Klingon said, unhesitating, and drew—a dagger.</p><p>The crewman laughed.</p><p>And then the Klingon laughed too, a huff of breath through his nose, and tossed the dagger to the cargo bay floor. "That's my best knife," he said. "I don't want it dirtied with your blood," and even as his voice ground itself into a snarl on the last word, he was already moving.</p><p>The crewman drew his own weapon, a disruptor that fired bright white bolts—he shot once, twice, but the Klingon had already closed with him. One bolt sliced through the Klingon's upper arm, but it didn't slow him down, and he struck the crewman across the face so hard that she had to duck out of the way to avoid the crewman's body as it crumpled to the floor.</p><p>An instant's perfect silence—and then half the slaves began to scream, and the crew to shout. One of them raised his own weapon and aimed it at the Klingon's back.</p><p>She didn't know she was going to move until she did. The Klingon's dagger lay where he had tossed it to the floor; only a step away from her. She ducked down and grasped it, and somehow her body, her hands, understood how to handle the weight of it, how to move it. She straightened up again, and threw—it felt clumsy, having to do it with both arms, wrists bound together by the restraints, and at the same time as far as she knew she had never done it before, with one hand or two.</p><p>Except it worked.</p><p>It shouldn't have. Surely it shouldn't have. But she hit the man—the Orion—in the hollow of his shoulder, and his first shot went wide as he cried out, stumbling.</p><p>The Klingon turned to look at him, and then at her. There was something in his face that made her feel strange and hot all over.</p><p>Half of the other Orion crew had started to move; but now they stopped, hesitating. The Klingon allowed his gaze to rove their faces with clear contempt, and then turned his back to them and stalked over to pull his knife out of the man who lay groaning on the floor.</p><p>No one moved. The Klingon looked at his blade, which was now dripping muddy orange blood, with mild distaste. And then he angled one leg, wiped the dagger with ostentatious deliberation against a long strong thigh, one side and then the other, turning it in his hand with casual ease.</p><p>When he was done, he sheathed it, and looked up. "As I said. Give that one to me, and I'll leave."</p><p>The crewmen looked at each other, and then at her.</p><p>The Klingon waited, eyebrows raised, for some objection. When none came, he crossed the bay and reached out, gripped the restraints where they crossed between her wrists, and said, "Come."</p><p>She swallowed, and followed the pull of his hand as he turned her back toward the turbolift. And no one stopped her.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>The Klingon's vessel wasn't much larger than the Orion ship had been, as far as she could tell. But it seemed larger, not least because the only crew member appeared to be the Klingon himself.</p><p>"Sit down," he said, sharp, and she did it. He didn't look at her, busy at the helm controls. Even if the viewscreen hadn't been active, she'd have felt the hitch as the docking clamps released, before they detached from the station.</p><p>The Klingon kept working. Plotting a course? She didn't know where he was taking her, didn't know how to ask when the answer would probably mean nothing to her even if he gave her one.</p><p>At last he was finished, and he turned to her as if he didn't know why she was still there.</p><p>"Thank you," she said.</p><p>He tensed, full-body, eyes hard. A mistake, then, but she had no idea why. He seemed to know her; she must have known him. And he'd learned what had happened to her, and had come for her. Surely that meant something. How strange could it possibly be, that she should thank him for looking for her, finding her, saving her?</p><p>"Lost your memory <em>again</em>," he bit out, scoffing. "Humans! How do you manage, when you're all so fragile?"</p><p>"Humans," she repeated, looking down at herself. "And you're—Klingon. You knew me before."</p><p>He laughed, but it was a snide laugh, a bitter laugh. "Oh, yes. And you knew me, human." He looked away, and offered as if offhandedly, voice rough, "Tirax."</p><p>His name, she thought. And she couldn't even return the favor.</p><p>"Who am I?" she said.</p><p>His jaw worked. "Czerny," he spat, low, so fast she could barely catch it, and then, even more viciously, "Jean."</p><p>"Jean," she repeated.</p><p>She couldn't remember ever having heard it before. But it felt right anyway, in the same place in her head where the headaches always started.</p><p>There was one threatening there now, hanging over her. But she was too eager to learn more to care.</p><p>"And we—"</p><p>She got no further. She didn't know what had happened, at first; the ship was a blur around her, she felt weightless—had they crashed, or been fired upon? And then she struck something, the breath knocked from her, and she felt hands twisting into fists in the shapeless gray shirt she wore.</p><p>It was Tirax. He'd gripped her, lifted her out of the chair in front of the auxiliary console and practically hurled her the three strides it took to shove her up against the wall of the bridge. He hadn't removed the restraints, from her wrists or her ankles; she couldn't move her feet far enough apart to even kick him.</p><p>"We," he ground out, leaning close, dark eyes flashing, "loathe each other, Czerny. I took every opportunity to torment you, and you—"</p><p>He stopped. Something that wasn't fury crossed his face, obvious in its contrast and yet impossible to read.</p><p>And then his lip curled. "On Peneli, you wouldn't even kill me honorably. You left me alive, bested, <em>humiliated</em>. I should choke you to death right here—"</p><p>"But you won't," she snapped.</p><p>He made a harsh disdainful sound through his nose, incredulous; that was how she knew it was true.</p><p>"If you hate me so much, why did you come for me?" she pressed. "You learned what had happened to my transport, that the Orions had me. You knew they were headed for that station. You fought them for me—"</p><p>"I was ordered to," he gritted out.</p><p>"Then aren't you pleased? To have me bound, ignorant, helpless—you could have told me anything, and I'd have believed you. That I was your servant after all, that I owed you everything—"</p><p>He laughed, mouth twisting, and then reached up with one hand and gripped her jaw, fingers digging into one cheek, thumb pressed into the other. "Where is the pleasure in hating you if you don't know how to hate me back?" he said, low, and he was—he'd leaned in closer, breathing the words almost against the corner of her mouth. Her heart was pounding again; she was furious, the angriest she could ever remember being, and he looked into her eyes and smiled. "Yes, there it is—that fire, that venom. That belongs to me, Czerny, and even the Orions and their mind-scrubbers can't take it from me."</p><p>"No," she agreed, as coldly as she could. "I think I could be scrubbed a thousand times and still learn to hate you again."</p><p>His smile widened; he loosened his hand, patted her cheek patronizingly with her fingers, and for a moment she thought about turning her head, catching those fingers in her mouth and biting down.</p><p>But then she remembered something else.</p><p>"And I am—bond to you?" she said.</p><p>He tensed. His hand was still closed lightly upon her face, his gaze still fixed to hers; he was still close, closer than she could remember ever being to anyone, though of course that didn't mean what it should have right now.</p><p>"If only," he said at last, strange and quiet. "I could put you to many uses, human, if the right were mine."</p><p>She shivered, helpless—she didn't know whether it was fear or heat that rushed through her. Maybe it was both at once.</p><p>"Enough," he said, more loudly, and all at once let her go. "Stay here. There must be something on this ship that can cut through those."</p><p>The restraints, she realized dimly. She stood there, watching him stalk away, and when he had passed through a hatch and was gone, she could finally allow her knees to weaken, sagging back against the wall.</p><p>She still didn't know where he was taking her, how long the trip would be; whether he knew how to fix whatever the Orions had done to her mind, or would take her to someone who could. He knew her, when she was a stranger even to herself—he was bigger, stronger, armed.</p><p>But she'd beaten him before, she thought. He wouldn't have lied about that. And memory or no memory, she promised herself she would figure out how to do it again.</p><p> </p><p> </p>
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